


A Moment Of Their Time

by mansikka



Category: Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: First Kiss, Happy Ending, M/M, POV Magnus Bane, Sad Magnus
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-28
Updated: 2017-07-28
Packaged: 2018-12-08 01:28:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,267
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11636100
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mansikka/pseuds/mansikka
Summary: Magnus needs to forget about Alec, and what better way to do that than with several martinis at a bar?





	A Moment Of Their Time

**Author's Note:**

> Hello :)
> 
> Well, here's a third Malec fic that nobody asked for, and I didn't really plan on writing, just started typing. It doesn't really 'fit' anywhere; it's more an exercise for me, in trying to find their voices. So... enjoy? x

It was ironic, Magnus smiled wistfully to himself, turning the martini in his glass in a gentle swirl as he stared at the solitary olive at the bottom, how his immortality had cursed him with all the time in the world, yet not one soul had ever found him worthy enough to give him more than a moment of their time.

Perhaps it wasn’t irony, Magnus amended, taking a sip and barely tasting a thing, perhaps it was just the way things were meant to happen. The price to pay for living indefinitely was that eternity was meant to be lived alone. If only he couldn’t feel a thing, didn’t have his head turned, and then his heart, didn’t notice anything of value in all the people around him. Although more often than not it was the other way around, Magnus amended with a mournful sigh to himself, because he really had no choice in the matter. When his heart called out for someone, he had to follow, and it was then that he noticed the depths of their eyes. And it made no difference really, because either way, no matter the circumstances, no matter the situation, no matter how often he scolded himself not to, he always fell. Ending up entirely alone.

Hazel eyes swam in his vision then as though to prove a cruel point, and Magnus blinked them away, going back to studying the swirl of his drink, adamant he would lose himself in that instead. The bar he was in, a dimly lit, muted black hole of a place that he would never normally visit, let alone frequent, was Magnus’ company for the evening. And yet the evening itself was all too familiar, the aftermath of when he’d dared to open his heart to someone, only to be rejected all over again.

And by a Shadowhunter of all things, Magnus groaned to himself, knocking back the remainder of his glass and signaling immediately for another. Though in the case of Alec, Magnus sighed, that might very well have been a case of his head turning before his heart. How could it have not, when Alec strode into his life, an obsidian shadow passing by as though a specter in his world, then fading out again, disturbing the very air around him so that everything appeared to be slightly blurred and missing something in his wake, and Magnus couldn’t ignore the pull to follow.

Alec was different, though, Magnus insisted to himself, taking a moment to thank the barmaid and slide her an overly generous tip. Alec was a conundrum, a puzzle he could look at from every angle yet never tire of seeing, and still not quite figure out. He’d love to try though, Magnus thought, his heart sinking, would love to understand why just the presence of Alec resonated something in him, a tuning fork that left his very essence humming, and leaving Magnus with the distinct impression that he had come home.  

Alec, though, Magnus sighed, closing his eyes as though that wouldn’t immediately conjure further images of him, Alec did not want to be studied. Did not want to be looked at, or figured out, or even spoken to, apparently. When he’d come to see Magnus in the loft earlier that afternoon, Magnus had hoped, so very hard, that perhaps he’d had a change of heart.

Heart, Magnus huffed to himself, taking a larger gulp of his drink than he’d planned on and spluttering a little for it, having a heart was what had gotten him into this mess in the first place. If only he hadn’t noticed him, Magnus berated himself again with another sip, if only he hadn’t—

Magnus pressed his hand against his shirt pocket for a moment, feeling the cell phone vibrating there, then pulled it out, frowning at the screen when Alec’s name glared back at him as though by thinking of Alec, he had conjured him there.

“Alec,” he said, cautious and full of question as he accepted the call, already bracing for the latest request for his assistance, since when didn’t Shadowhunters call on him for constant help?

“You’re not home,”

Alec’s tone was confused, bordering on accusatory, and Magnus reined in a smile at the thought of him standing outside his apartment block, frowning at not being let in.

“Your observational skills are a credit to your training,” Magnus replied, sipping at his martini and leaning a little harder against the bar.

“Are you… are you busy?” Alec asked, and Magnus pictured him shifting from foot to awkward foot, eyes scanning up the side of the building as his eyes pinched into a deeper frown. No one frowned quite as thoroughly as Alec did, Magnus smiled to himself, then caught himself doing it and shook his head.

“Evidently, Alexander, I am not so busy that I could not answer your call. Though for anyone else…” and Magnus forced his words to come to a stop. He’d promised himself earlier in the evening before that very first martini; no more flirting, no more seeking out ways just to be near him, no more looking for excuses to have anything else to do with Alec Lightwood, or in fact any Lightwood at all.  

“So, you’re not,” Alec said, a little blunt, a little mistrustful, and Magnus could have kicked himself for the way his tone had him fighting not to smile all over again.

“Was there something I can do for you?” Magnus asked, keeping his voice as free of emotion as possible, imagining portals, and summonings, and who knew what else the Clave would call on him to service for them. He was tired of it, beyond tired, perhaps not quite tired enough to leave Brooklyn altogether, but tired enough to perhaps disappear. Live a different existence, at least for a little while.

“I thought… I thought maybe we could talk,”

The glass slipped from his grasp to clunk down on the bar in his surprise, and Magnus flinched at the splash of martini as it jumped up and began wicking into his sleeve.

“...Magnus?”

In a flurry of activity, Magnus downed his glass, waved an absent hand to the barmaid who had kept him supplied with martinis all evening, and rushed out to the street. He paused at the sudden rush of cold air, asked himself to think clearly, to not get his hopes up, to not let his guard down all over again.  

“Talk about what?”

“I just… I tried to talk to you earlier, and I couldn’t. I… it feels like we’ve got… a lot to talk about,” Alec said, every word sounding uncertain, and Magnus couldn’t tell if it was because Alec didn’t believe what he was saying, or if he doubted Magnus would even want to hear it.

With a decisive nod, Magnus portaled into his loft, sending a blast of his magic to open the door for Alec to let himself in downstairs. He took the time Alec would need to make his way up to glance himself over in a mirror, smooth the shirt down on his chest, and fix on a smile of what he hoped was indifference when he swung the door open wide in greeting.

Alec did not steal the breath from his lungs, he did not, Magnus told himself firmly, fixing his eyes on Alec’s face and definitely not letting them sweep down the length of him, taking in his ever present black.

“I hope I wasn’t interrupting anything,” Alec said as he stepped through, and Magnus turned from shutting the door behind him with a light shove, to watch the back of Alec’s head as it tilted and turned, as though seeking something out.

“Nothing that I cannot return to another time,” 

“I should have… maybe I shouldn’t have just showed up unannounced,” Alec stumbled out, once Magnus had walked to stand to the side of him. Whatever reason Alec had for coming, whatever words he had been rehearsing on the way over, Alec didn’t look ready to voice out loud, and Magnus was struck with the sudden urge to leave so he didn’t have to hear them, yet was desperate to hear every single one.

“Well,” Magnus smiled, magnanimously, he hoped, “I’m here now,”

“I don’t… I don’t know what I’m doing here,” Alec admitted, his gaze falling to the carpet beneath them, as rapid as the dropping of Magnus’ stomach. Magnus cursed himself once more for that flare of hope he’d allowed to unfurl, and made himself smile a little harder.

“Well—”

“Don’t do that,”

Magnus became perfectly still, a tiny eruption of laughter threatening its escape, for the look of surprise on Alec’s face at his own words. “Don’t do what?”

“That,” Alec repeated, flicking his fingers vaguely towards Magnus’ chest, just enough to make him look down to make sure nothing was there, “that… smile you always give when someone—when I’ve said something that’s upset you, or… I don’t know, annoyed you somehow,”

“I can assure you—”

“I know when you’re really angry at me; it looks completely different,” Alec interrupted then, and if Magnus didn’t startle a little for the way his lips curled up into the ghost of a smile.

“You do,” Magnus answered, more statement than question, telling himself he was not enamored.

“Yeah,” Alec agreed, frowning a touch and having to dart his eyes away again, scowling across the room as though the book case they’d settled on was offensive.

“Alexander—”

“Why’d you always pretend nothing ever bothers you, huh?” Alec said then, whipping his head back to look at him and apparently staring into his soul, for how quickly it made Magnus’ heart feel like it had stopped. “Like… I don’t know how to act around you, and so I lash out, or I… I take stuff out on you when I… when I don’t know what I’m doing—”

“You—”

“And you just take it,” Alec finished, sighing and allowing his hands to thud down against his thighs in exasperation.

Feeling out of his depth, Magnus moved across the room, preparing himself a drink and belatedly offering one to Alec. Alec shook his head, watching his every move, and in doing so making Magnus’ heart race and his fingers tremble, as he pleaded with himself not to react.

“Would you just stop?”

At the frustration in Alec’s voice, Magnus’ fingers paused just inches from the glass he was about to lift up, stranded in mid air for a few seconds before he could make himself turn back around.

“I—”

“I like you,”

Magnus’ stomach gave an uncomfortable clench, first at Alec’s blurted out confession, and second at the startled look on his face for getting the words out. And then he watched, waiting for Alec to spin on his heel in embarrassment, and walk out of the apartment, never to return unless his duty to the Clave forced his hand.

“I like you,” Alec said again after staring back at him for an agonizing pause, “I don’t—I don’t know what that means, exactly, but… I know I do. I like you. I don’t know how to stop,”

Magnus’ heart plummeted, failing to keep his shoulders squared, when all he wanted to do was curl in on himself. Alec wouldn’t be the first who had come to him for a spell, a potion perhaps, to take away the pain of feeling something for someone that they didn’t want to; he’d just never had to provide it to someone who wanted to use it to rid them of himself.  

“Alexander,” he said, hearing the tremble in the false amusement of his tone, and seeing Alec’s eyes flicker and narrow as though he heard it as well, “honestly, I’m flattered. However—”

“If you even pretend to joke your way out of this, I’m gonna… I think I might end up breaking something,” Alec said then, his hands clenching into tight fists by his sides, his entire body vibrating as though he didn’t know whether to step forward, or turn and run. And if he stepped forward, Magnus wondered, sure he could feel waves of confusion rippling out from Alec, then what would he be stepping forward to do?

“Al—”

Of all the ways to be made to shut up, Magnus thought, a little dazed as he stumbled forward at the same time as Alec, their chests bumping together as though to hold them both up, then being kissed quiet, by a firm, insistent, demanding Alec, was probably going to be something he requested time and time again. He might even try to keep talking, just to invite it.

Alec’s hands were steady as they cupped his face, though Magnus could feel the tremble there in his palms as he slid them away again. And, fearing Alec would pull back from him altogether, Magnus pressed his own palms into Alec’s waist, trying to anchor him in place, and keep himself steady at the same time. Perhaps he shouldn’t have worried though, because Alec’s hands made it as far as Magnus’ shoulders, curling around them for a moment before sweeping over to hook his elbows, crossing his forearms behind his head. Alec stumbled forward again, though there was barely a breath between them to do so, sighing into his mouth, and letting out a soft groan that Magnus liked to think had a sense of overdue satisfaction about it.

Telling himself this was not happening, and that if it was happening, well, then it was merely a fleeting moment he should not get wrapped up in, Magnus fought not to enjoy it too much, because it could be any second that Alec pulled away again, with more reason than ever not to come back. But Alec, constantly surprising Magnus since the day he’d met him, seemed to melt against him, sinking into their kiss with repeated sighs that made Magnus dare believe he might be enjoying it as well.

When Alec finally broke their kiss, Magnus tensed for the inevitable pulling away, but then Alec smiled at him, a rueful, shy, elated smile that Magnus was helpless not to at least echo in poor imitation.  

“I don’t know what I’m doing here,” Alec repeated, his voice surely an octave or two lower, and the smile on his face turning up into a triumphant grin.

“That’s not what that felt like,” Magnus found himself saying, his fingers gripping into Alec’s sides a little tighter as though that might keep him from slipping away.

“Did it… I mean… was that okay?” and the doubt, the sincere uncertainty on Alec’s face then as he asked had Magnus doing the unthinkable. Claiming a second kiss without asking. Fearing an objection, but not really giving him the time.

Alec hummed into it, kissing back just as insistently, and Magnus would swear that the corners of his lips repeatedly swept up into yet another smile against his own. He had to be dreaming, surely, he argued with himself, though not doing anything but continue to kiss him, allowing his hands to sweep around and press against the small of Alec’s back, pulling him closer still. But then in a fit of pure indulgence, Magnus darted his tongue out along the seam of Alec’s lips, and the stuttering gasp in response did things to him, things that Magnus was sure Alec was not ready for, or looking for, or had even got as far as imagining with him.

Alec flicked his tongue out to taste Magnus’, and Magnus was convinced he was seeing stars. And for a stretch of time that could have been mere minutes, or possibly several hours, Magnus kissed Alec back, allowing himself to sink into it, daring to believe it was really happening. They wrapped around one another, stood in the middle of his loft apartment as though the rest of the world had disappeared, with the only sound filling the air around them being the press of their lips together, and the occasional sigh or murmur of encouragement.

When Alec began to pull away again, perhaps eons later, Magnus quickly schooled his expression in, hiding behind that mask of indifference that pretended his lips weren’t kiss bruised, and his eyes weren’t sparkling with sheer joy. But Alec rolled his eyes at him, and to Magnus’ astonishment, wrapped him up in a hug, pressing an absent kiss into his neck that Magnus was adamant he did not shiver at receiving.

“You’re doing it again,”

Magnus swallowed hard at the accusatory words muttered into his shoulder, tensing as Alec pulled back just enough to smile at him.

“What?”

“That thing you do when you want to shut the world out, so it thinks you’re not bothered by anything,” Alec replied, and if this was what Magnus had to contend with from then on, he thought, letting himself luxuriate in leaning back against him—a slightly smug, pleased with himself kind of Alec who knew exactly what he did to him, well. Magnus wasn’t about to complain.

Don’t trust it, Magnus urged himself with his next heartbeat, please, don’t trust it, don’t open yourself up to being hurt yet again, when you know how this will end. But as though he’d said those words out loud, Alec nuzzled against him, then took a larger step back and grasped his hands.

“I really don’t know what I’m doing here,” he said again, his voice soft, though urgent, calling for Magnus’ attention, and pulling at his heart, “I don’t know how to do… any of this stuff,”

“It’s okay,” Magnus tried to tell him, adamant he would cherish this moment and not let himself dwell on it too many times. Though how many was too many, he asked himself, his thoughts spiraling, how many would—

“Magnus,”

That teasing, affectionate tone in Alec’s voice, Magnus didn’t think he’d ever heard from the Shadowhunter before; in fact from any Shadowhunter. In fact, he mused, he wasn’t sure he’d ever heard such a thing in his very long life being directly aimed at him. But if—

“Magnus,” Alec said again, laughter lacing through that tone, accompanied by a squeeze of his fingers, “this is important, okay? And it’s… hard enough to get any of this out, when you keep zoning out on me, like you’re not gonna like what you’re gonna hear,”

“Apologies,” Magnus replied, squeezing Alec’s hands himself, steeling himself to listen.

“Look,” Alec said then, a touch of serious hitting both his expression and his tone, “I’m… not sure how this—any of this, is gonna work. But if you want me to… I mean, only if you want…”

“Yes, Alexander?” Magnus asked when Alec’s words trailed away, arguing with himself that he was not holding his breath, not getting his hopes up, not opening himself up to be hurt all over again. As he had been doing, all evening.

“I’d like to try. This… us… whatever this is… I don’t know how to do it, but… I wanna try,”

That confusing, settled feeling Magnus was sure he got from just being in Alec’s presence swept in on him then, seeming to cocoon him in a reassuring warmth of certainty that told him to give in, to stop resisting, that this was something he could trust. “I’d like that,” he heard himself say, smiling what had to be more honestly, for the pleased one he received in response.  

“Good,” Alec replied, smiling before leaning in to kiss him once again with more confidence, unhurried, exploring, and stealing from Magnus all sense of time.


End file.
